


Smoker's Delight

by soliloquysfromintermission



Category: Good Omens, Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Gabriel Being an Asshole (Good Omens), Michael is trying her best, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-02
Updated: 2019-09-02
Packaged: 2020-10-05 09:29:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20486654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soliloquysfromintermission/pseuds/soliloquysfromintermission
Summary: Or: How An Archangel and a Lord of Hell became friends and learnt about earthly bonding activities





	Smoker's Delight

**Author's Note:**

> What happened to my other works, you asked? 
> 
> Well. 
> 
> Life. 
> 
> Also I will be going back to them but hey, at least I can promise this will be short.
> 
> Things to note: 
> 
> Michael: She/her or he/him  
Dagon: They/Them  
Gabriel: He/Him  
Uriel: They/Them  
Sandalphon: It
> 
> (Dagon, Gabriel, Uriel and Sandalphon's pronouns were thanks in courtesy to the Good Omens discord server, who got them from the official script book. Michael's pronouns are actually He/Him, but I wanted to explore the possibility of them changing up pronouns throughout the fic, so it will change.)

In all aspects, Heaven and Hell were, in the easiest way possible to describe, housed in the same office building.

This was something that Upper Management and Lower Management were rather proud about doing, something that the Principality Aziraphale and the Serpent Crowley didn’t even have to lift a finger into influencing. It had been decided (Jointly, as agreed by both sides) that it would make things easier to blend in for any angels or demons who may choose to explore Earth and its boundless possibilities. It also meant that the building was, for all intents and purposes, meant to blend into the cities of every country available on the planet. The building was state of the art, and depending on where you went, they had everything you needed.

There were only two escalators.

But then again, considering which two ‘companies’ housed the building, there was only need for two escalators after all.

* * *

Just like every office building, though, there was a need for rules.

Anyone who has worked in an office would attest to the kind of rules that the office would have in place. Photocopying body parts, whether officially issued by Human Resources or stolen from the warehouse Human Resources had housed the human bodies either department used, was banned. Plants, if any, were to be watered by a roster that was issued by each department head. And of course, smoking, if any, was to be done in the designated areas, such as smoking rooms.

Of course, smoking rooms were, to put it mildly, rather old fashioned. Each department had a smoking room, of course. Being an angel or demon meant having to deal with human misery or tribulations, no matter which side you were on, and so for these angels and demons, they needed coping mechanisms. Both Gabriel and Beelzebub had, in the past, turned a blind eye towards angels and demons who had taken up any sort of habits to help them in their daily job scopes. Angels who were meant to be helping humans through trials of faith, had to regularly stop themselves from regularly miracling up money or saving little Timmy from the well by divine intervention. After all, what use would life be if not to teach humans some sort of lesson? To cope with making sure they didn’t resolve the matters in their own hands, they relied on little habits like pressure balls, alcohol, and of course, smoking.

Demons, who were more inclined towards image and reputation more than angels in every way possible, took up smoking because they could. Hell was rather hot, after all, and fire was everywhere, so smoking was more of a rule than the exception. Of course, Hell’s offices were also more inclined to resemble the dank, wet and humid basements and bunkers, and always conveniently located under a sewer, which meant that mould tended to form in the ceiling and drip, menacingly, onto people’s desks. How the conditions of Hell’s working environment managed to house hellfire and not blow up any other demons was a rather delicate situation and demons often walked on eggshells all day long hoping that today was not the day they would get burnt by the hellfire that would occasionally pop up. Not that the fire would actually hurt a true demon, but the paperwork that would get destroyed in the process was just irreplaceable, and there was always more of it to be done.

So smoking rooms were built in both Heaven and Hell to accommodate the angels and demons who needed a break to go in, open a new pack, and light up safely. Heaven’s smoking rooms were bright, airy, and often smelt like fresh lemons after Beyoncé sang. Hell’s smoking rooms were dingy,dark and smelt like the inside of underpants belonging to an old man who had made an indiscreet deposit and had waited for it to accumulate interest. To smokers, it was their only source of relief.

Until recently.

* * *

Michael, first of Her name, patron Archangel of the warriors, the sick and healing, blinked in surprise. Beside her, Uriel, who was looking rather uneasy, opened their mouth to speak but closed it just as quickly. Sandalphon, the smarmy bastard, was smiling indulgently, but it often did when in the presence of archangels and anyone higher in ranking than it was, eager to please and willing to fervently gush over the brightest light that shone out of the other’s arse.

“- And with these new initiatives in mind,” came the source of said arse, “We hope to increase workload by 110%, by the name of Our Lord, She who is all knowing, and eliminate the terrible habits of our team!”

Gabriel. First of His Name, patron Archangel of arseholery, arseholes and those who were on their way to talking out of their arse. And he was holding a meeting to try and eliminate the smoking rooms.

The SMOKING ROOMS. The only bright light of Michael’s day to day work life. Her raison d’etre. Her little light of hers. The light that she would light up and willingly shine, let it shine, let it shine, all the time. And Gabriel, her superior, technically her boss and the Assistant General Manager when She was not available to implement rules in Heaven, was going to take them out of the department.

Never had her hand twitched more for her own flaming sword that she wielded against the forces of evil than today.

“Our reports have shown that smoking, while technically a way for our workforce to cope with the duties as performed by the Host, has also shown much dependency and overreliance from angels who should be, first and foremost, do their duty to Our Lord above!” Gabriel continued, not realising the drop-dead silence that was happening in the meeting room the archangels were holding this in.

The powerpoint slides that Gabriel was currently showcasing was currently on a slide which showcased a little puppy, drawn in a cutesy manner, with big pleading eyes begging them not to light up in the smoking-room.

Michael was an Archangel of course, and technically meant to set an example to the rest of the Archangels and the Host, but she would have given anything to drop kick the puppy into the sun, along with Gabriel’s frankly sickening Mac Desktop, the Powerpoint presentation, and of course, Gabriel.

He was always doing this! Gabriel was always being a pompous twat, implementing work initiatives as a way of inculcating “team morale” and “synergy”, and claiming it was done out of concern for the health and lives of the Archangels working in the department, when really it was all about him and his own beliefs in clean living and swanning about in human-style designer labels!

Michael was doing all the hard, dirty work, making all the tough calls, setting agents and cameras to capture the goings-on on Earth, and actually creating a dialogue between Heaven and Hell. She had personally carried the holy water Downstairs during the aftermath of the failed Armageddon, for crying out loud! And yet Gabriel swoops in, steals all the credit for *her* work, and gets lauded as a hero and First of Her Host!

Michael’s hand automatically patted her pockets for her silver tin, which housed the slim sticks that were technically not her Salvation, being a high-ranking Archangel after all, and rather sacrilegious to admit out loud, but very very close.

* * *

And so it was that Michael found herself downstairs and out of the office building, leaning against the glass windows of the lobby, taking a long, deep drag of her cigarette.

Technically she wasn’t meant to be outside of the office building unless she was on Earth for official business. The office building was housed in the dimension that was neither here nor there, but always moving and existing everywhere and anywhere, which meant that anytime she left the building, she would often be in a different place on Earth. The Principality Aziraphale, of course, was housed in London, and so was the Serpent Crowley, formerly Crawly, and they both often managed to find the building anytime they wanted, but they were used to it and always managed to leave the skyscraper lobby in the same place they entered from. Michael, who only left the building during official business, didn’t have the same knack.

Today, she was smoking outside the skyscraper in what she was pretty sure was a country in Asia and a modern one at that. Michael was not as sure about the different ones, they seemed to pop up in multitudes in the last 5 decades, and developed an identity so quickly and distinctly that it overwhelmed her sensibilities. In any case, the city she was in was busy enough that nobody paid attention to the red-headed angel smoking as though her life depended on it.

“ Well, you’re a sight for sore eyes, Archangel.” Came a voice that Michael knew.

The Archangel didn’t reply at first, but she tilted her head to confirm that the new arrival was the same demon she knew.

Indeed it was.

Michael gave Dagon, Lord of the Files, Master of Madness, and Under-Duke of the Seventh Torment, a nod.

“ Haven’t seen you around much.” Michael replied, after blowing out purple smoke in the shape of unicorns. She may be the Head of the Host, but she missed the animals since their extinction after The Flood. She had never questioned Her orders when told, but she did feel a bit of wistfulness when told of their demise in the report Gabriel sent up after the event. They had been beautiful when she had seen them in one of her early trips to Earth, when She had been showcasing the prototype of Eden to her and the rest of the Archangels.

“It is what it is, Michael,” replied Dagon. They eyed Michael and the cigarette she was holding and turned their lips up in a sneer. “Didn’t think you of all people would need an addictive substance," they sneered. "Wouldn't want people to think the Great Michael couldn't rely on anything beyond her own means and ways. Who knew that behind the strong woman angel was someone who needed cigarettes to cope?"

Michael, who internally bristled at the accuracy of Dagon's insults, outwardly just rolled her eyes. Her interactions with Hell's forces in exchanging information that benefited both departments meant she saw Dagon more often than not, as Dagon recorded and filed everything as was their designation. The demon Ligur had been there too but since the Holy Water incident, Hastur had been promoted to be Hell's representative in swapping intelligence between both parties, information which they could use to then work towards their own agenda. In the past, it was understood that the information was meant to make sure operatives on Earth did the jobs they were supposed to do. Admittedly Crowley and Aziraphale were prime examples where the system failed but that had been due to a rather dismissive handwave of the possibility that the two representatives were upright members of their sides and would never flout the rules in any way. 

The result was Arma-fail-ddon. Michael took it upon herself to make sure it would never happen again. So she went to every intelligence meeting with the forces of Hell. Gabriel, the lazy arse, couldn't be bothered. "Not my department, Mikey!" He would call back when she stopped by his office to ask if he was interested in joining the meeting, and so often she had to lead the team that would meet with the representatives of Hell. 

In a way, she respected Dagon. The demon often kept their head down, never went off on a tangent the way members of their teams did (read: Uriel, who quoted from The Sound of Music and was angry at the Nazis for ruining one of the sweetest love stories and mentioned it often, even during serious meetings), or pompously overblew their knowledge and understanding of humans (read: fucking Sandalphon and it’s boasting that pornography involved tossing salads, and then tried to demonstrate using cherry tomatoes, cucumbers and ranch dressing. A confusing time was had by all during the meeting.) Dagon never tried to kill anyone during the meetings like Asmoedeus or tried to chat Michael up like Belial did. Sure, she did let out a sly remark or two, however, it was always after the meeting, when both parties regarded each other with suspicion while shaking hands. 

"Dagon," was all she said levelly. " A pleasure." 

The Lord of the Files snorted in derision, a perfect response to the blatant lie. 

The both of them stood in silence, side by side,with their backs against the skyscraper where they both worked. 

"Why are you here, Dagon?" Michael asked conversationally. While Heaven and Hell were technically meant to be enemies, the immediate grounds outside the skyscraper were considered neutral grounds, an area decreed by both Upstairs and Downstairs to be sacred and even. And as per that ruling, any demon or angel that met each other on the immediate grounds could not physically attack or try to discorporate each other. Sneering, tongue sticking out, and pulling of faces between either party was fine. Michael respected the rule and was civil to any angel or demon she met on the grounds, no matter their rank or side they were on. 

Dagon rolled their eyes at Michael's politeness, but replied,"The smoking rooms downstairs got destroyed again, so Lord Beelz has decreed that everyone find alternative spots to smoke instead. Unfortunately that has also caused more fires and my cigarette stash got stolen. I came out here to get away from the pandemonium." Now that Michael got a good look at the demon, she could see that the demon was looking rather lethargic, and their fingers were trembling. They must have been without for awhile. Michael could, at the very least, sympathize. She was an angel after all, and her feelings of love, compassion and empathy were renowned notable amongst the angels. It was one of the reasons why she had at one point been the Patron Saint of the sick and healing. 

So she did what any angel on the neutral ground would do for a demon in need. 

"Here," she said, digging into her jacket pocket that contained her silver tin of cigarettes and offering one to the sharp-toothed demon. Dagon looked at the white stick with suspicion, and Michael rolled her eyes. "Neutral ground remember?" She said. 

Dagon narrowed their eyes but took the proffered stick, pressed down on the filter until she heard the crack, and then lit the cigarette, taking a deep drag. When they exhaled, the smoke took form as a black dragon, with red eyes. 

Michael whistled. "I could never do that," she admitted. "The shapes I usually get tend to become rather…"

"Saccharine?" Dagon completed, taking another drag, and creating a multi-legged insect out of the smoke. "Sweet? Cutesy-wutesy?" 

"One of those adjectives," Michael muttered. 

It was the first time she saw Dagon smile, and her angelic nature meant she smiled in return.   
  
  


* * *

It became a routine between the two of them, to meet outside the building and share their cigarettes, smoking them and trying to see what shapes and animals they could create. Dagon, as it turned out, was rather competitive and kept trying to create smoke that would become bigger and more elaborate, trying to outdo Michael at every turn. Michael, who spotted the pattern Dagon would play, would often play the game a little safe and tease Dagon into creating more elaborate shapes until their stick would reach its end, and Michael would then play her most intricate, most beautiful smoke shape then. 

Today it was a castle with a streaming moat, the pastel blue of the smoke flowing in different directions from the medieval structure, a creation that even Dagon was impressed by. 

"Never knew you had that much imagination," Dagon said grudgingly, their eyes reluctantly alight with the wonder of a child. Michael smirked. 

"It's based on a castle I saw back in France, during the 15th century," the Archangel admitted. "The Dauphin's in Orleans."

"I remember that," Dagon replied. " The whole peasant girl business. Wasn't that one of yours? The angel that the fucker Crawley kept around was useless, from what I remembered."

  
  


Michael remembered Aziraphale, uneasy in a suit of armour, looking for all the world like a cuckoo who had grown up with the notion that something was not right but had no actual idea why standing next to its starling parents. She had trained him herself with the flaming sword for near thousands of years as he grew from cherubic Cherub to a rather awkward man-shaped Principality, and yet he still looked like he would rather be anywhere but in France, helping Michael to persuade a teenage girl to lead an army in Her name. 

In the years later, Michael often thought about Joan, and the whole business made her feel empty and sad inside, one of the reasons she stopped leading the Host in everything but name and had taken up smoking to cope with the regret. It was another situation where she did not question the Lord's orders and carried them out, but it had meant she lived with the numerous possibilities and realities in her imagination about a world where Joan lived, the rich and devoted Lord and knight she could have wed, and her descendants doting on her in old age and calling her Granmere with reverence. 

They had dated for a short while after the whole business when Joan had been promoted to Sainthood and was given an office in the Upstairs department.  
  
  
The relationship had went up in flames.   
  


Right now though, Michael let out a pleasant hum, happy to have a moment of time just to indulge in the act of smoking, her eyes closed. Her angelic nature, however, could sense how the Lord of the Files was beginning to relax.

* * *

  
As Michael and Dagon spent more time together during smoke breaks, they had taken to sharing, and opening up a little more about their lives.    
  
It’s hard to explain what angels and demons get up to in their free time. Technically, angels and demons are never off the clock, per se. Angels could literally spend centuries and millennia upstairs at their desks, floating around composing symphonies, supervising cloud formation, and making lists about smiting their enemies. In recent years, thanks to one of the Archangels having accidentally sat in on an Apple iPhone product launch on Earth (read: Uriel), the Archangels had taken it upon themselves to convert Heaven’s offices into what could be described as a millennial’s playground. Angels could regularly be seen on segways and hoverboards. Some angels played in the giant ball pit filled with plastic balls and foam in the shape of cuddly, winged animals. There was even a computer room where gamer Angels could take part in, ‘Job Simulator” (a great platform for angels to pretend to be mundane and human, a novelty on their part) and Muddy Heights (a misunderstanding on their part, they didn’t realise that humans did not regularly poop off roofs, and this was their only way of understanding the importance of human bowel movement). The office was a great success, but it meant that Angels did not ever leave the office.    
  
Michael dearly wished they would leave the office. 

She liked peace and quiet, and she needed respite from her Archangels.    
  
She may have been created to spread and love all of God’s children and creatures, but sometimes it meant she wanted them to spread out across Heaven, time and space and she could love them from far, far away.    
  
Demons were similar to Angels in that they could spend literal centuries and millennia away at their desks, but that was due to the literally irreplaceable paperwork, as well as old, failing equipment that kept catching on fire or attacked by mould. A great portion of time was spent fixing the equipment, and many a creative swear was created by each demon when trying to glue two ends of a slide projector together after some sort of fire demon got loose and melted the plastic. As Lord of the Files, Dagon spent their days filling out form after form and filing them in the Cabinet of Shame, and since IT had not taken it upon themselves to upgrade after Windows Vista, there was almost no virtual filing station in place.    
  
Dagon revelled in the misery of their job, while also felt like they were drowning in the despair that was filing. Also, no one ever got why it was not okay to leave smeared yoghurt all over the requisition forms.    
  
So both Michael and Dagon started to share their frustration about their jobs during their smoke breaks, which included griping about their bosses. It had started off small: Michael making a small comment about how some colleagues had been extra trying that day, and Dagon murmuring about how they knew the feeling. Then, Dagon ventured further by ranting about a colleague of theirs, using a pseudonym that honestly didn't hide the true identity of the subject in question but Michael appreciated the effort, deciding to follow suit when she ranted about her own useless colleagues. 

It then devolved into…

"FUCKING GABRIEL!" yelled Michael, who threw her cigarette down and stomped on it with her pristine white-heeled boot. 

Dagon raised an eyebrow. "Swearing out loud, in public?" They asked. "How terribly gauche of you."

Michael didn't care, she kept ranting,"I asked if we could rework the budget to accommodate for new program updates for HeavIn Design- thanks to the versions we have to work with, the design for the new breed of animals we were hoping to introduce in the next quarter-century are delayed by a full MILLENNIA- AND GABRIEL SAYS MY TEAM HAS TO LEARN HOW TO WORK AS A TEAM AND SOLVE THE DESIGN FLAWS OURSELVES?!" She furiously opened her tin of cigarettes and realised that despite the fact that she was a literal Archangel, even she could be the victim of running out of cigarettes. The growl she made was unearthly, something so old and ancient that the humans in the nearby area looked up, thoroughly unsettled. 

Dagon rolled their eyes, but they understood. "At least you have HeavIn Design," they grumbled. "Right now Windows Vista installed in our systems has made us run so slow we might as well be turning back to the 15th century again!" They flicked ash into the ground of the building and looked up.

The both of them were standing outside the building that housed both Upstairs and Downstairs, this time finding themselves in a city Dagon had helpfully explained was Melbourne's Central Business District. Michael, who hadn't been down to see Earth for centuries unless on important missions and even then she kept with Gabriel and his team, had forgotten the names of the new nations, much less their cities. Dagon, who was Lord of the Files, had an almost encyclopedia-ic knowledge of every deceitful aspect of humanity, including the names of cities. She knew Melbourne. Crawly, slippery Serpent that he was, had claimed in his multiple memos about the amount of work he had done here, which had included the invention of Vegemite, the long-held Melbourne-Sydney rivalry which ended in bloody fisticuffs, and the Great Potato Cake/Scalloped Potato saga of Twitter. Dagon never understood the way the Serpent worked but it got results and Crawly's key performance indicators showed that he had regularly hit his targets of corrupted souls every bi-century when the annual audit came about. They at the very least respected that Head Office loved Crawly.

Michael was still growling and while Dagon appreciated seeing the normally unflappable Archangel coming a little unbent, it wasn't helping with their cigarette situation. It also didn't help that Michael's lack of venting meant her angelic features were becoming more obvious, the gold flecks that adorned her face shone like fire. The humans walking past them were beginning to stare as Michael's eyes started to light up with righteous fire and Dagon was pretty sure humans didn't do that. 

So they made a suggestion. 

"Pub?" 

**Author's Note:**

> This entire premise was taken from Neil Gaiman's idea that Heaven and Hell were housed in the same office building, and also from the idea that Neil and Terry once wrote that Heaven and Hell didn't permit smoking.


End file.
